Beauty By Toxicity
by angst cupcake
Summary: House/CSI Cross over - It was not why, or who, or where about their deaths. It was how.


A/N: Alright. So. I've had this idea in my head for a long while of crossing-over both _CSI: Crime Scene Investigation_ and _House M.D._ E________________E

I obviously own neither seeing as you would probably all be watching reruns because the casts would never be seen again. WHOOPSIE. :'D Let's get on with the story shall we?

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Prologue:

_He moved carefully. Any little detail, even just a hair off, could fuck the entire course he had planned. The sound of his breathing was labored, the chemicals cleaning out any infectious substances getting into his lungs, as well as the suit kept it from getting through his skin or any other possible orifices._

_He was a classy man. Enjoyed art and collecting it and his time alone was well spent in pockets of money he had set aside for the pictures and vases and books that aligned his home. Such beauty. It was sad that not much of it existed, or rather, had died away with the greater artists of many years ago. He was the last one left. He had to make the world beautiful again._

_He sighed, the obnoxious waft of sterilizers making him cough and sniff as he worked. He took the small trinket, a necklace plated in gold and adorned in soft cut pieces of zircon that glittered (one of his many works of art) and he laid it out in the black, velvet box. No one would see what he'd done or what he'd worked inside the mixture of gold paint. It was just another heirloom to the unsuspecting eye that he would be turning in to a nearby jeweler's, hoping for a few extra bucks._

_He grinned as he tilted the box, watching the necklace shine. He hoped whoever it was, she (or maybe even he) was pretty when they wore it. The least he could was make them happy with their last purchase before the inevitable swallowed them whole and there was nothing left..._

_Now, onto that pretty silver watch._

--

Grissom's face pulled into a tight frown and he placed a gloved hand over his mouth and nose to block out the smell; Christ, it was rancid. The victim lay face up – well, not exactly. In fact, her body was arched in a sharp upside-down 'U', locked into place and David had said she had been in this position since _before_ rigimortis had set in and the fact she was _still_ like this, even after an estimated two days since her death had passed, was...well, _should_ be impossible.

"Huh. Don't see this everyday," Catherine crouched beside him and Grissom looked up, nodding, "Cause of death?"

"Choked on her tongue." Catherine passed him a curious glance and Grissom reached over, tweezers in one hand and forced the girl's jaw (which had to be opened via a jack due to the strange lock of muscles) open again and a gray blob tumbled out, still clinging to the inner mouth by a mere thread of decaying flesh.

"She bit it off." Catherine said, sounding rather amazed.

"It would seem that way. Her inner cheeks look like she tried to gnaw through those too." Catherine bent in, features contorting as she mimicked Grissom by putting her hand to her face. The girl's eyes were still open and rolled up, the bottoms of the irises showing. Her arms were flung out on either side of her, a purse stranded a few feet away as if it had been thrown, innards of the bag scattered everywhere and it was then that Catherine noticed just how angled her body was – her head was touching the backs of her ankles.

"Christ, her spine should be broken."

"Mmmm." Grissom hummed in agreement, face bland as he stood.

"Do we know who she is?"

"No. But her hands are clean so we should be able to get an ID soon. I had Greg pull her prints and we should be getting the results back in a few hours." The two settled into silence, staring at the body with a some sort of sick fascination and disgust, lights flashing off the unseeing eyes of bright reds and blues from the cop cars behind them.

"Grissom?" Grissom looked over at Catherine but Catherine was not looking at him, but at the body.

"Yes?"

"...what is this?" Grissom followed her eyes back to the body and he was quiet for a long time.

"I don't know."

--

A good fifty miles from where Catherine and Grissom stood, a man named Gregory House along with fellow staff sat in Carson City Hall. Well, House didn't sit. Moreso he sat slumped in his chair, legs stretched out in front of him, glaring at the large projection screen, noisily chewing on a Twix.

"Will you stop that?" House looked up, Cuddy staring at him in exasperation.

"Awww, c'mon mom, just one more bite?" The man in front of him turned around, hushing him and when he turned back, House pulled a face behind him and Cuddy rolled her eyes.

"Very mature House." Came Foreman from beside him and House' gaze transferred over to him and then beyond him where he could see Chase and Cameron, eyes intently locked to the screen. He scowled.

"Don't tell me you actually find interest in this," The man in front of him turned around again and before he could hush him, House beat him first, "It's not polite to stare. I know how frustrating it must be to be around someone so handsome but you'll have to wait until the conference if over for autographs." The man huffed angrily and when he turned back to Chase and Cameron, he could see Cameron's lips twitching in an amused half-smile.

House sighed, turning his attention back to the projection and the stocky man with a thick mustache droning on and on _'and on and on and on and on' _and as House thought this, his head bobbed from side to side with each 'on' that passed through his head. He couldn't remember why he'd agreed to come to this stupid thing.

Oh wait.

Yes he could.

Because Wilson was being a stubborn bitch and had sunk back into himself _again, _wallowing once more in his grief for Amber and her passing and how much he missed her and blah, blah-blah, blah, blah. And Cuddy had come to him and had not asked, but rather forced the plane ticket into his hand and told him he was coming whether he liked it or not because they needed at least five representatives from their district hospital to show up for the Doctoral Conference.

Of course, Wilson was supposed to go this year because House had been the one to go last year and it had been somewhere up near Niagara and while the view was nice from the hotel, the complimentary white water rafting had not been. House still hadn't forgiven Cuddy for shoving him out of the boat and for a good few weeks (months, really) following, he seriously thought of every possible way you could kill a person and make it look like an accident.

"I don't know about you guys, but I think I'm finished here." House stood, stretching noisily, attracting the attention of others around him as he clattered for his cane and Cuddy's face flamed up and she hid it in her hand, pinching the bridge of her nose as if she'd come to grow an instantaneous migraine.

But while everyone's attention seemed to come to him, House's eyes narrowed in on another man who had seemed to stand just about the same time he did in the back. Probably mid-twenties. Dark hair. Dark eyes. Probably fresh out of med-school. But, at the moment, he didn't look so fresh. House watched as he stumbled from the row, upsetting a few people along the way as he held a hand over his mouth and dashed out the doors.

Naturally, House decided to follow despite Cuddy's protests.

Or well, _tried_ to follow. Because by the time he'd reached the doors, a woman came bursting through them, blond hair wild and flinging about her shoulders, eyes wide and terrified.

"Help! Help! Oh god, help please!" She grasped at House frantically, pointing out through the doors and people were roused up, staring on in curiousity and House's face set in a tight scowl as he forced the woman off of him and brushed through the doors. The young man he'd seen before lay on the floor, convulsing, blood bubbling from the corners of his lips. There was a woman beside him, a rather luscious red head who probably only worked where she worked because men got a kick out of her and it gave her a reason to make them all seem like pigs.

At the moment, she was trying to pin the other down while simultaneously grabbing at his mouth and trying to force it open because, as House could now clearly see when he moved closer, that his teeth were clamped down on his tongue, chattering open and closed as if he were purposely trying to chew it off. The man suddenly coughed, splattering blood across the red head's face and her tight blouse and she shrieked, scooting away frantically. People had begun to gather in the doorway now, but at this point, no one seemed to be able to do anything much more than stare.

Except the blond who'd come through earlier who charged forward through the mass of people, waving her arms frantically, trying to snap them all from their daze as she screamed and pleaded.

But even she stopped, her voice faltering when the young man's body began to arch more sharply off the floor, sickening snaps following each jolt and House suddenly thought of a pretzel as he watched the boy's body jerk harder now, practically forcing his back to curve as he came up off the floor, movements stiffening – and there came a loud crunch as the boy's head met the backs of his heels and he suddenly ceased to move at all. His eyes were rolled up and glazed over and people stood in silence.

And then his jaw seemed to unlock, his mouth falling open – and his tongue lolled out, dropping to the floor with a messy, wet plop.

The blond began to scream.

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